Gathering
by Dixie Dewdrop
Summary: Against his better judgment, Jethro plays host to his father and to his team.  This is part of my Here and Now scenario.
1. Coercion

Coercion

For the third time in an hour, Jethro Gibbs attempted to sway his father. "What I'm saying, Dad, is you don't know them like I do. You have not spent the time in their company that I have. They are on their best behaviour in front of you. It's a sham. You don't see how they really act."

Rolling his eyes, Jackson responded, "Just don't worry about it, Son. I did the inviting, and the cooking's taken care of. You don't even have to work the grill. Doctor Mallard and I will tend to it. You just relax."

Gibbs felt a stab of remorse. He wasn't sure why he felt the need to negatively influence his father's anticipation.

Jackson spoke again. "I invited your team to a meal, to a gathering, because they work with you every day. You depend on them and they depend on you. This little soiree gives them, and you, a chance to see each other in a different perspective. It's just a meal, and everyone is contributing a dish. The only thing we are responsible for is the food to be grilled- the chicken and steak. Everything else is set. The only task assigned to you is to provide your home. That's it. Just try to enjoy yourself for a change and just stay calm for a change."

A bit chastened, Jethro made his way to the backyard and checked the status of the grill.

Half an hour later the environment was completely transformed. There was laughter, chatter, movement and excitement. All of the guests had arrived, laden with vegetables and desserts, drinks and breads. Tony and Abby, the most familiar with their boss's kitchen, were pulling plates, glasses, and cutlery from the cupboards while Ziva, Tim, and Jimmy were arranging the serving pieces and food buffet style on the outdoor picnic table. Ducky joined Jackson and Jethro at the grill, and the gathering was complete.

An hour after that everyone sprawled across various pieces of lawn furniture, stuffed from the bounty of the evening. Jethro let his gaze pan the backyard, and he regarded his coworkers with genuine affection. The younger set was arguing, though laughing wildly and pointing fingers, over how the clean up was to progress, while Ducky and Jackson were trading one tale of adventure after another with each other.

Finally, Gibbs clapped his hands and firmly called out, "Hey- all of you get yourselves up and get on to the cleaning." Tony, Tim, Jimmy, Ziva, and Abby jumped up together and grabbed dishes to ferry back into the house.

Whistling, Jethro ordered, "Ziva, you and Jimmy wash up. Tony and Abby, put everything up where it goes, and Tim, finish taking everything from the yard to the kitchen!"

There was a chorus of "On it, Boss" and "Yes sir, Bossman," and then a sudden quiet blanketed the outdoor domain.

Ducky and Jackson smiled conspiratorially and Jethro continued, "Sometimes they exhaust me just listening to them." The older men laughed together.

Inside the home Jimmy watched Abby and Tony open and close cabinets. "You two know your way around, don't you?"

"That's 'cause we've stayed with Gibbs many, many nights, and many, many days," explained Abby.

"That's brave of you," offered Tim.

"No, not really," Tony elaborated. "it's always kind of neat to be here, where we belong. Gibbs is such a dad..."

Abby interrupted, leaning up to push a platter to the top of a cabinet. "Remember when we stayed out 'til three and he was waiting on us when we got in?" She started giggling.

Jimmy's eyes went wide. "What happened? What did he do?"

Tony started laughing, and Ziva narrowed her eyes and demanded, "What were you two doing here at the same time anyway?"

"That happens a lot, actually," Abby explained. "Like that time, it was Tony's apartment had no heat. So he was going to be staying here several days. Naturally, I asked Gibbs if I could stay, too. Sometimes if I know I'm spending the night I'll go ahead and invite Tony, but most of the times Gibbs will have already done it. That's why there is so much of our stuff- clothes and all kinds of our various possessions in the two upstairs guest rooms."

She paused a moment and added, "Actually, Gibbs has let us pretty much decorate and furnish those rooms- our rooms- as we want."

Ziva, Jimmy, and Tony exchanged shocked glances. "I, for one, would be scared to spend the night," ventured Jimmy. "Agent Gibbs scares me."

Everyone laughed appreciatively, then Tim insisted, "Well, finish the story. You got in at two in the morning and…"

"No," interrupted Abby, "we got in at three, and he was not pleased! See, we told him we were going to the nine o'clock movie at the mall, and he was ok with that. Then when we got there we found out that there was a _Friday the Thirteenth_ marathon in progress. So we didn't get out of the theatre until way after two."

Tony joined in, leaning against a counter, "Of course we'd cut off our phones during the movie, so naturally we didn't know he'd tried to call both of us, numerous times, I might add. We all know the rule about never being unreachable, right McSecret?"

Tim rolled his eyes in response, and Abby continued with the narrative. "So it turns out that he was really worried when we didn't get back at eleven, and really got freaked when we didn't answer our cells. When we got back home and he found out what we'd done he was furious! That was on Friday night, and we weren't allowed back out of the house until we went to work Monday morning! Our butts got grounded!"

The NCIS audience roared with laughter, and Tony added, "Hey, at least we were grounded! For a few minutes there while he was yelling at us, I thought we were going to get spankings!"

That brought more laughter, and the group changed topic to decide what they would do next. Tony came up with the idea of creating a dance club, which was enthusiastically endorsed by the girls.

"What about Gibbs? He's not going to let us play loud music outside in the yard. He's probably getting ready to come inside anyway." Ziva pointed out a couple of the obvious obstacles to the entertainment plan.

"I'll go check," offered Tim, who ran to the back door, peeked out, and returned. "All three of them look pretty content and happy. They are just sitting there talking."

"Ok," Jimmy said, "I've got some music in my car- let me go get it."

He headed out, and Abby ordered Tony, "Let's go to our rooms and get our cds!" They took off, racing for the stairs, trying to beat each other getting up them.

Ziva and McGee finished wiping dishes and headed to the living room. Jimmy returned just as Abby and Tony flew back down the stairs, clutching a cd player and disc after disc. Stopping in the hall, everyone paused to cement their plans.

"Where are we going to go?" ventured McGee. "He won't trust us in the basement. How about one of your rooms?"

"No," Abby said, "there's too much furniture in our rooms, and there's nowhere to move it. We won't have room to dance."

The discussion continued and finally they concluded that the living room was the only logical choice for the dance club. Quickly they appointed Abby to ask permission.

"He won't hit you," Tim pointed out.

"Hey," Ziva called, "Say it to Jackson. Gibbs won't contradict his dad if his dad says yes!" That was met with a chorus of approval, and Abby made her way outdoors while the others began moving furniture and setting up a dee jay station.

The three older men stopped talking at Abby's approach, and smiled indulgently when she started speaking to Jethro. Before she could get finished with the request, Gibbs said no, so Abby turned her attention to Jackson and continued begging. Jackson melted at once, "Son, come on- all the young people want to do is play music in the living room. That's not that big a deal."

Ducky added his voice, "Jethro, really, let the young people enjoy themselves. If they are doing something inside, they won't be bothering anything outside."

Jethro shook his head but gave in, "I'm just telling you I've seen them in action and I know they can destroy something before you can turn around."

Then, noticing Abby's mouth turning down he capitulated, "Ok, go ahead, but don't tear up anything and all of you are going to fix the room back!"

Abby leaned down and kissed his cheek, then Ducky's, then Jackson's. Running back inside, she relayed the good news.


	2. Fun and Games

Fun and Games

An hour later, out in the yard, the men finally decided to return to the indoors. Standing up and stretching, Ducky spoke, "Well, look at that. We haven't heard a word out of them in quite a while, Jethro. That means they have been entertaining themselves without any complications. How about that?"

Jackson clapped him on the back and nodded, "See, Son, sometimes you've got to just turn loose of the reins. Enjoy life a little bit-"

Not willing to concede, Gibbs shook his head and contradicted, "Maybe, but we haven't seen the house yet. For all we know, there are huge holes in the wall. It's taken me until this year just to train Abby and Tony not to throw inside, or to run when they're inside, for that matter."

The kitchen was pristine when they entered and the three nodded appreciatively to each other. Then they became cognizant of the music blasting from the living room. Jackson held a finger to his lips for silence and motioned to the other two to follow to the living room doorway. The younger set was so engrossed in the fun that they didn't even notice the spectators.

Ducky, taking in the scene before him, murmured, "Oh my….."

Flo Rida's _Low_ was rocking the room, compliments of McGee, the acting deejay. McGee was spinning cds around and had found a hat, which he proceeded to remove, then put back on, remove, then put back on, and finally, to sail it across the room. He was dancing as he supervised the cd player.

The rest- Tony, Jimmy, Ziva, and Abby were dancing as well, completely uninhibited, in the cleared living room floor. Jethro stood stunned as he watched Jimmy and Ziva. He'd suspected that Tony and Abby would be good dancers, but he was genuinely surprised at the other two. Ducky regarded his assistant with some pride, thinking to himself that Jimmy never ceased to amaze him. Jackson marveled at the gyrating and movement of the four, and determined he had never seen dancing like that.

Before the onlookers could speak, Abby took her turn to go "low, low, low" while the others sang out loudly with the blasting music, "those apple bottom jeans, and the boots with the fur,". Then the others followed with their turns at the center of the room.

After a couple of more choruses the music changed to another obvious favorite. Scrambling in position, they began calling out, "Go Tony!" or "Go Abby!" as they hit the floor for a Sean Kingston song that chorused, "Somebody Call 911, Shorty's fire is burning on the dance floor!"

Gibbs turned to Jackson, who asked, confused, "Who's Shorty?"

"Oh my," spoke up Ducky, "One of them is going to sprain or strain something. How can they dance like that without self injury, or injuring one another, for that matter?"

Neither of the other two responded- they were still glued to the spectacle before them. Jethro felt a twinge of pride watching Abby and Tony- they were dancing with abandon, and had gravitated towards each other as the song started to wind down. Abby was lithe and moved gracefully, and Tony's sports prowess was understandable watching him move.

Spinning suddenly, like a top, Jimmy spun around the perimeter of the room and came face to face with the onlookers. He stopped immediately, embarrassed and certain that somebody's wrath was going to rain down on his head. Ziva, right behind him, slammed into him during the abrupt stop. The two fell to the floor, which caused the entire proceeding to come to a halt. McGee stood with his finger jammed on the player's stop button and a horrified look on his face.

Abby was the first to recover. "Oh hey, Gibbs," she called out. "Aren't we good?" The others were attempting to catch their breaths and recover from the unanticipated cessation of their fun.

Tony moved over to her and whispered comically, "I think we're going to get sent to our rooms."

She nodded, but forged ahead. "Do you want to join us?"

Jackson and Ducky burst out laughing, and staring at the Goth with affection, Jethro joined in. The three older men turned and made their way to the kitchen, where Jethro started a pot of coffee, and Ducky started a pot of tea.

After a couple of minutes while the guests agreed that it was ok to resume, the music and dancing continued another half hour until the dancers were completely exhausted.

Running into the kitchen for drinks, Tony leaned on the back of Jethro's chair and asked, "Boss, can Jimmy and Ziva and Tim just stay and spend the night here with us? It's late, and you know we've got room."

Gibbs instantly opened his mouth to say no, but Ducky and Jackson looked pointedly at him.

Sighing, he accepted defeat and responded, "Ok, but I want the living room clean and all of you up those stairs and in your rooms in half an hour. No more- and you are not sitting up talking all night in one of the rooms. The girls are going to bed in Abby's room, and you three boys in your room."

Tony had moved in front of his Boss and was nodding agreeably with the instructions.

Recalling night after night of dealing with Tony and Abby, Jethro narrowed his eyes to a glare, though. "In addition, none of you are leaving your rooms, even to say or do just one more thing, or to get another drink of water, or anything else. There is no reason for you to stay up all night. I mean it. You and Abby have enough clothes here to give the others some night clothes. You know where the extra toothbrushes are. I don't want to regret this. Got it?"

"I got it, Boss. May I say something?"

"Only if it has to do with going to bed- I want all of you up those stairs and getting ready to sleep in the next thirty minutes."

"It does. Thanks for the Gathering, Boss."

With that, Tony jogged back to the living room. The sounds of furniture moving, laughter, and running up and down the stairs and back and forth across the hall followed.

Then finally, peace permeated the residence of one Leroy Jethro Gibbs.


End file.
